Dana White didn’t have much patience for Sean Strickland’s latest round of contract talk. Asked about it after Saturday’s UFC Fight Night in Edmonton, the UFC CEO waved the whole thing off with a calendar reminder. Jed I. Goodman posted the clip on X, and BJPenn.com wrote it up.
“There’s absolutely no issues with his contract. He just signed his contract in May,” White said.
That was the entire answer, and from the way White delivered it, he considered the matter closed.
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Strickland had been at it for days. The middleweight champion went online to say he was thinking about giving up his belt, moving up to light heavyweight and burning through the rest of his deal as quickly as he could so he could fight Jake Paul. Then he doubled down. His complaint was about money, and he aimed it straight at the biggest paycheck in the sport. “McGregor makes 30 million to fight for 30 seconds, and they don’t want to pay us a fraction of it,” he wrote. He also said the idea of a fight with Paul “sounds fun,” and he floated “giving up my belt, going to 205” as a real option rather than a joke.
The timing gives White’s response its sting. Strickland (31-7) fought this past May at UFC 328 in New Jersey and won the middleweight title back with a split decision over Khamzat Chimaev. If White has the date right, the champion signed his current deal during the same month he got the belt back. Before Chimaev, the 35-year-old stopped Anthony Hernandez by TKO in the third round, so this run has been hard won.
Nobody has booked his next fight yet. Nassourdine Imavov is widely seen as next in line at 185 pounds, and the matchup looks like the obvious one, but the UFC has not made Strickland vs. Imavov official. Strickland also hasn’t signed for a defense, which is why his talk of vacating gets more attention than it would from a fighter with a date already set.
My take: White answered a different question from the one Strickland asked. Strickland never claimed the contract was broken. He said the gap between what a draw like Conor McGregor earns and what a working champion earns feels insulting, and saying “he just signed” doesn’t address that. Still, the champion gave White the opening. When you complain about pay five months after agreeing to it, people will point to the signature before they look at the numbers. And Strickland talking about a move to 205 in order to chase Jake Paul won’t make him much money while Imavov is waiting at middleweight. The leverage he does have is the belt itself. Until he defends it, every post about Paul only gives the company a reason to wait him out.
